


Between Dusk and Dawn

by digidigi_monmon



Category: Digimon - All Media Types, Digimon Adventure, Digimon Adventure Kizuna, Digimon Adventure tri.
Genre: All the kiddos will be featured at least a little, F/M, Takes place around Kizuna, and general creepiness, best friend Taichi, good doses of both fluff and angst, original characters and Digimon will be featured, tad bit of violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-09
Updated: 2020-11-09
Packaged: 2021-03-09 01:22:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 11,753
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27462640
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/digidigi_monmon/pseuds/digidigi_monmon
Summary: Koushiro, Mimi, Taichi, and Ken investigate a disturbance in the Digital World, which slowly spirals out of their control, when the "protector" of the forest begins to hunt them.
Relationships: Izumi Koushirou | Izzy Izumi/Tachikawa Mimi
Comments: 8
Kudos: 19





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hello! Welcome to this ficlet, which originally began as a tiny idea and has since blossomed into something a little more out of control.
> 
> The focus is on Koushiro and Mimi, and their loosely defined relationship. Mimi travels a lot and spends a lot of time in NYC, while Koushiro is invested in his company in Tokyo. The two love each other, but it's hard and they each have very real doubts. 
> 
> There may be other relationships added as I continue!
> 
> I don't own Digimon or any of the characters.

Gargantuan conifers, their upper branches interweaving and brushing against each other in hurried whispers, loomed over Mimi and Koushiro like diabolical gargoyles as they pushed their way through the forest with Palmon and Tentomon. More than once, the hairs on Mimi’s arms stood up straight, and her ears pricked with a foreboding that the trees were watching them in bitter interest, as if they were four crawling ants. Not just watching. Murmuring. About them. She rubbed her arms in a feeble attempt to shake the dread from her bones and pin the paranoia on watching one too many horror movies. Twice, a twig had fallen, and Koushiro's head snapped towards the noise like a slap to the face. She found no comfort in his parallel uneasiness; if anything, her spirits plummeted further because he was supposed to be the rational one. Their Digimon made no comment at all. No one wanted to disrupt the taut tranquility. She longed for a break in the trees, but the wood only grew thicker the further they trekked, smothering them from every angle. 

Their meandering had been pleasant at first, delightful even, since Mimi had been in Tokyo on one of her sporadic visits when Koushiro received the alert from Gennai, and she relished in the rare opportunity to be useful to the team once more. Before the group split into pairs, they all talked with ease and smiles, catching each other up on classes, work, and life in general as if no time had passed between their last reunion. Even when she and Koushiro broke off the main path to venture west, while Taichi and Ken remained northbound, the two continued to chat side by side about the silliest, mundane topics - musing on what to grab for dinner when they returned to the human world, figuring out a time to meet up with both sets of parents, remembering that she downloaded the latest Walking Dead episode before leaving New York...the domestic coziness of their ‘something’ left her torn between latching onto that warmth forever and hopping on the next flight back to the United States to run away from it. Only to be drawn back to Tokyo once more. Back to Koushiro. She couldn’t deny it. But it was a difficult truth to bear.

As if the Digital World read her suffocating thoughts, the trail had narrowed and the pines grew tall and dense, blotting out the afternoon sunshine. Mimi fought the urge to run, craning her neck in a sweeping motion, absorbing the endless trees surrounding them like an enemy horde closing in for attack. Disturbing melted into a sinister notion that they were trapped. The forest floor reeked of dank earth and moldy vegetation, basked in a stagnant, grey bleakness that didn’t dissipate as the trail slithered up the hillside. They switched to a single file line, Palmon in front because she could detect movement on the ground with her roots, Tentomon bringing up the rear because he could easily maneuver in the air, and the two humans sandwiched in between. They hadn’t come across a single Digimon since they began the journey, and Mimi checked her phone for the tenth time in a span of minutes. Nothing from Taichi or Ken. No sounds other than their own footfalls and the whispering of the trees. They hissed like snakes in her ears, malice dripping from their needles. She gripped the strap on her bag until her knuckles turned white.

“Hey Koushiro,” she said, trying to keep her voice level and calm. “Do you think we should have stayed together? Or waited for a different day so that more of us could have joined?”

“We’re here today as a scouting mission,” he said, turning his head around to her. “Collecting information related to the disturbance that Gennai detected in the forest. Splitting into two groups allows us to cover more terrain while also ensuring our protection, and I think smaller is better...for now, anyways. We have nothing but Gennai’s word to go on. Why bother tying up everyone’s busy schedules when we don’t know exactly what we’re dealing with? It’s not like we’re kids anymore.”

Mimi sighed. Why did everything that came out of his mouth have to make sense?

“Although,” he mumbled, “I do wish Hikari was here.”

“Hikari? Why?”

Koushiro halted, arching his head back to scan the area. “Something’s wrong. Here specifically, after the sun disappeared behind the trees. It’s only a feeling, and I don’t like to draw conclusions without hard evidence, but I don’t have any other facts to consider at the moment. Hikari has a natural link to the Digital World and understands the delicate balance between light and darkness. If something was askew, she would have more of a definitive answer.”

“You're right,” she said, which brought his eyes back to hers. “I can’t explain the creepiness, it’s like these trees are aware of us. I don’t think we’re welcome. And it’s cold, numbingly so.”

“I don’t think it’s related to the temperature, but I know what you mean. It’s raw. Oppressive. What about you two?” Koushiro asked the Digimon, who gathered around their partners once they had stopped walking.

“There’s nothing here,” Palmon said. “But it is eerie.”

“Yes, I have the inkling of being followed,” Tentomon added. “Though I don’t know what’s doing the following.”

Mimi shuddered. “That’s not reassuring.”

“It’ll be alright,” Koushiro said, resting a hand on her shoulder. “We knew something was going to be off or else we wouldn’t have been called. Let’s keep going and keep our wits about us. We may be able to find our bearings at the top and determine our next course of action. I’ll text Taichi to ask if they’ve felt anything off where they’re exploring.”

Mimi nodded, forced to acknowledge again that Koushiro’s reasoning was sound, but unable to keep her nagging fears at bay. He noticed her reluctance and brought his hand down to hers.

“We haven’t crossed paths with any resistance so far. That has to be in our favor. We’re not so unwelcome as to be thrown out of here immediately.”

He turned around and they continued to climb. She stayed as close to him as she could without hindering his ability to maneuver around protruding rocks and fallen branches, fixated on his auburn hair in front of her and Tentomon’s wings buzzing behind her. She could make out Palmon’s lazy steps in front, sweeping over the earth, if she listened hard enough. Still. She couldn't wholly block out the trees' stares, boring into her, sneering at her exposure. 

Their going was slow at times, when the incline grew steeper and steeper, and instead of a rolling hill, it seemed they were hiking up a mountain that never peaked. With every step, her shoulders leaned more forward, struggling to bear her own weight; and she counted mutilated pinecones that reminded her of skulls on the ground, while her lungs, legs, and feet pulsed in aching misery. Sweat trickled down her face, stinging her eyes if she didn’t wipe it away quick enough. This was worse than spin class back in New York. The trees and brush around them all blended together, and Mimi had half a mind to turn around and forget about the entire thing, when Koushiro muttered, equally out of breath, “Are we going in circles?”

“What?!” she cried.

“It doesn’t make any sense. When we started on this trail, it looked to be a couple miles in length, but we’ve been walking for hours since then, and I can’t tell if we’ve made any progress or not.” He pulled out his phone. “It’s a little past 5pm.”

“We came to the Digital World around 1 or so, right?”

“Thereabouts. I’ll admit I wasn’t paying much attention to my watch, but I’d estimate we’ve been wandering around by ourselves for a few hours at least. I may not be in the best shape, but something doesn’t add up. And I haven’t heard anything from Taichi. It’s not like him to ignore a message. It sent from my end, but the forest may be interfering.”

Mimi sank down on a stump, a mossy dampness seeping into her jeans, but she didn’t care. She couldn’t, she wouldn’t, take another step.

“This stupid forest is one huge maze,” she said, “and now we’re stuck. Like I said. It doesn’t want us here.”

Koushiro sat down next to her on a bed of golden pine needles, his chest rising and falling haphazardly, and he teetered over, resting his head against her shoulder. He appeared to be more winded than she was. It was as good a place as any to take a break and for him reassess their situation, so Mimi rummaged through her bag for the water bottle and snack bags she had packed before they left. It wasn’t much, and her stomach growled for more sustaining food than crackers and almonds, but it was better than all the times they went hungry in the Digital World as children. She made sure that the Digimon ate their fill because they needed to keep up their strength more than her and Koushiro. She wasn’t convinced that the forest would allow them to leave without a fight, so if she snuck Palmon and Tentomon a few extra crackers, then it was only to ensure that they would be able to evolve when the time came. There were no ‘ifs’ about it. 

She passed the bottle back to Koushiro, and he took it mechanically, lost in his own head, a phenomenon she recognized by the glossy look in his eyes and crumpled nose. She left him to his own devices and listened to Tentomon tell Palmon about the latest topping choices at the frozen yogurt bar since the last time they visited Tokyo. Mimi recognized the typical chocolate candies and fruit pieces, caramel and marshmallow sauces, but Palmon’s eyes lit up when he listed off cupcake flavors with various frostings and sprinkles.

“Whole cupcakes!” Palmon said, clapping her hands together. “Oh, Mimi, can we go when we get back? I want to try the mocha one!”

If we get back. She forced the thought from her head and picked up her partner into a hug. “Only if you’ll let me have a bite.” 

Koushiro sprang to his feet, and the sudden movement jarred her into a high-pitched yelp. She was amazed at his spryness, but more captivated by the obsidian sheen deep within his eyes. She had been slow to appreciate the minute changes in his expression while absorbed in thought, but years of studying him while he worked led her to believe that he was worthy of being immortalized by Rodin, whose ‘Thinker’ lacked the profound glory that defined Koushiro’s countenance when he was in his element, piecing together riddles and puzzles. There was joy, too, if one cared to peel back layers of grit as Mimi had, a sparkling radiance that dripped from his eyes into his voice. Listening closely, she often detected electricity springing from his lips, and though she sometimes struggled to keep up with his extrapolations, she was enchanted by his energy. 

“What did you figure out?” Tentomon asked.

“If we’re going in circles it’s because we’ve stumbled into a glitch in the program. Of course. That’s why everything has been looking the same.” He groaned and pinched the bridge of his nose. “I should have noticed it sooner. Gennai will want to be informed, there may be other broken areas contributing to the disturbance.” He tapped out a message on his phone for at least a minute.

“Do you suppose that the glitch is what caused this section of the forest to feel so ominous?” Mimi asked. “Or did the problem in the forest cause the glitch?” 

Koushiro looked up at her with a teasing, toothy grin on his face. 

“What came first, the chicken or the egg?” 

“Spare me your riddles,” she replied with a dramatic eye roll, despite the corners of her lips twinging up into her own smile. “But you must have at least a dozen ideas by now. Your brain never shuts down, and the message you sent to Gennai was too long to only indicate a glitch. Let's have it." 

“I really can’t be sure,” he began, but when Mimi targeted him with an exasperated eyebrow raise, he cleared his throat. “Alright, alright, computer glitches are often easy to fix because they’re a temporary error in the system. Sometimes they’re created by a software bug, a mistake in the computer’s programming. Even the best computer programs that work almost perfectly still have bugs. Not mine, of course,” he added, making Mimi snort. “Anyways, it would be simple if we were only dealing with a bug. Gennai himself will be able to rewrite the program with little effort, but I don’t believe that’s our only problem. It may have been the initial one, but in some circumstances, bugs can be exploited by outside forces, allowing them to gain access to the system, sometimes to steal private information or insert malware. Based on the feelings we’ve both shared about the forest, I hypothesized the latter in my message. Even after the program is debugged, the malware will still be intact.”

Mimi stared at him, pressing her lips together. 

“Someone launched a virus in the Digital World through a gap in the code?” 

“I…well…in a sense, yes.” 

She didn’t have time to congratulate herself for following Koushiro’s rambling and jargon-filled explanation, she was too discombobulated, muttering under her breath, “Who? Why?”

“Finding a needle in a haystack would be easier, if this person knew what they were doing, but that doesn’t mean that after we restore balance here, I won’t try. Between myself, Miyako, and the Database of Chosen, I am fairly confident in our ability to track them down. As for the reason, I can only guess because they could. Having a Digimon partner doesn’t necessarily make someone a good person.”

“You think it was one of us?” 

“Almost positive.” 

There was a sharp tang to his voice, a harsh indignation brewing in his eyes that sent shivers down Mimi’s spine, but as quick as it came, his expression softened.

“At least we’ve made some progress,” he concluded.

“I don’t know about you, but your theory does not make up for the fact that my legs are jelly since we’ve only been walking uphill since this whole mess started. Tomorrow, I think the only moving we should do is from the bed to the couch...and getting frozen yogurt,” she added, when Palmon and Tentomon huffed in her direction. “So. Can you get us out of here?”

He laughed, stretching out his own limbs. “It should be a straightforward fix. We have to break the glitch by discovering the correct path. We’ve been walking right past it for hours. Palmon, will you help me?”

Palmon jumped at the opportunity, and latched her vines around Koushiro’s shoulders like she was his personal floral backpack. They headed down the trail and were almost out of sight when Mimi heard her partner exclaim, almost flustered, “Why don’t you ever visit us, huh?” and rubbed her temples. 

What type of person, with the understanding of what the Digital World was, would knowingly go out of their way to harm it, when they shared a bond with a partner? She couldn't rationalize it, the thought was too abhorrent. Ken had been brainwashed into assuming the Kaiser identity, and back then, the Digital World remained primarily hidden from humans, and it had been a mystery, even to them at times. But as the number of Chosen grew, so did humanity's perception and appreciation for Digimon and their world. For someone to be cruel just because, to toy with a place that they all, as Chosen, were connected to was too terrible. There had to be an explanation, Mimi depended upon it.

“Would you like it if Koushiro and I came to New York?” Tentomon asked, the question cutting through Mimi's thoughts, and she sat up straighter, brushing dirt off of her jeans, not because they were filthy but because it occupied her hands, kept them from shaking.

“Yes,” she said. “And no.”

“How can it be both?”

“It’s complicated.” 

“Is it? You and Koushiro sure go out of your way to make yourselves miserable.”

She laughed, and the hollow sound echoed in the still air between trees. She pulled her knees tight against her chest, wishing she had Tentomon's ability to view the world. As Mimi had grown up, she realized that the Digimon remained the same, glowing in their childlike wisdom, a stark reminder that adults were so often oblivious to the obvious. Or hiding from it.

“It’s hard,” she found herself whispering. “I think I’d be even more miserable if you came and left New York than I am when I return from Tokyo.” 

Tentomon grunted, crossing his arms and turning his head up away from her, and it took Mimi a moment to realize her mistake. 

“I didn’t mean it like that! It would be wonderful for you to visit me. The best café in the whole wide world is in the Upper West Side, only a few blocks away from my apartment building, and they make a salted caramel hot cocoa that is to die for.”

She smirked as her tactic worked and Tentomon shuffled back around to face her. 

“Whipped cream and caramel drizzle on top?”

“Chocolate shavings too,” she said. After a moment, she added, “I’m sorry I upset you. I would never in a million years be upset to see you, but I loathe the good-byes. They always reek of grief.”

“I hope that won’t stop you. I like when you visit us, Mimi. You make the apartment a home.”

A warm tingle pricked at her nose and the tops of her cheeks at the sheer sincerity woven in Tentomon’s voice. It was that quality which linked her to Palmon and the entire Digital World, rooted in the very essence of her being. She understood it as she understood herself without understanding why. But she wasn’t Koushiro, and unanswered questions didn’t plague her or weigh on her mind late at night. Mimi found comfort in letting certain things be. An imperfect pureness was its own truth. 

“I’m glad.” 

She reached down and embraced him somewhat awkwardly because unlike her partner, Tentomon was rigid and didn’t sink into her arms, but he patted her back with his claws like a parent consoling a toddler, and for the first time since they had stumbled into the dark wood, trees were the furthest thing from Mimi's mind. Instead, she was left wondering if bittersweet wasn’t such a terrible taste, if good-byes weren’t to be dreaded so long as they circled back to bright hellos.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mimi and Koushiro make their way out of the forest glitch in the Digital World, and instead of finding answers, they only uncover several more questions. (Please read trigger warnings in the notes!)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Hello, welcome to chapter 2! This was a hard one to write, and when you finish it, you'll understand. Please please please see the trigger warnings below! Hopefully by the next chapter, we will see what Taichi and Ken have been up to during this wild adventure.
> 
> Trigger Warnings: intensive pain/torture, disturbing imagery, sheer panic, consuming fear
> 
> I don't own Digimon or any of the characters.

Mimi wasn’t sure what she was supposed to be looking at. It might have been a trail, if she pretended to ignore how carefully concealed it was by frenzied bushes and haphazard ferns, but Palmon was so certain that it was the correct way that she didn’t dare question her partner. Tentomon fluttered a hundred meters down the path, but not far enough where they couldn’t still see him.

“It doesn’t open up much,” Tentmon explained. “But it’s a little more defined as you go along.”

“Told you,” Palmon huffed. “It hasn’t been maintained in a long time, but there are delicate impressions still on the ground from when it was used.”

Mimi made eye contact with Koushiro, and it was evident they thought the same, uncomfortable question: ‘By what?’ Usually they stumbled over Digimon left and right, but the forest seemed to be devoid of any life. 

Tentomon’s “a little” turned out to be an understatement. The narrow trail they left behind had been more comfortable to navigate than the slender, overgrown one they hoped would lead them out of the forest glitch. Mimi sidestepped to avoid brambles and maneuvered around thick, protruding roots to the best of her ability, but she couldn’t escape every thorny vine without receiving sharp scratches that tore through her shirtsleeves like paper, nor lift her feet high enough to keep from tripping over knuckled tubers. To make matters worse, a familiar ache in her glutes returned, and she realized that they were steadily making their way uphill. Again. This time, however, Koushiro was positive they weren’t walking in circles. Mimi pretended to be excited at his revelation.

The only solace was catching sunshine on her face. It caught her by surprise. Being too focused on each step forward to avoid further injury, she hadn’t noticed the change at first. The trees, more spaced out instead of crawling on top of one another, allowed sparkling flickers of light to penetrate through the canopy in warm, golden hues and a gentle breeze to flutter among the treetops. Although they remained dominating and somber, the sun softened their harsh features so instead of an impenetrable army, they reminded Mimi of old, weary men. The air was sweet on her tongue, a crisp featheriness that she hadn’t realized she missed until it filled her lungs, and the only sound to be heard was the rustling leaves above them. It was almost peaceful.

And then she tumbled into a prickly shrub.

Her skin seared red. Her toes throbbed. At least she wasn’t the only one. She paused and watched Koushiro, who lacked her grace, stumble, grunt, and groan in front of her, throwing his arms around wildly, and pushing branches with his laptop bag only to have them smack him in the shoulder.

“Isn’t nature supposed to improve mental health?” he muttered.

“Bushwhacking our way through it doesn’t apply,” Mimi answered, kicking down underbrush with a violent swing of her leg.

Koushiro laughed, but it came out more as a wheeze, followed by a sharp inhale, and Mimi, paying attention only to her feet, didn’t realize he stopped until she bumped into him, but he had stiffened like stone, interested in something away from the trail’s edge. She held on to his back and lifted onto her tip-toes to follow his gaze towards piles of snapped sticks, jagged rocks, and pine needles strewn about. His brows creased and he spun on his heels, she pivoting with him. Similar heaps were on the other side, and they were just subtle enough that Mimi wouldn’t have distinguished them from the forest floor if Koushiro hadn’t singled them out, but there were too many to be a coincidence. He took several photos with his phone and zoomed in on them for a closer analysis. They had agreed early on not to leave the trail for any reason other than immediate and life-threatening danger.

“I wonder if there’s a pattern,” he mumbled, more to himself than anything, but Mimi’s heart sank into her stomach.

There was no mistaking the thicker limbs for support, the longer ones for cover. The pine needles would both seal the top and create a soft bed inside, and the rocks would create a barrier at the entrance for added security. Koushiro’s downfall was being too determined to discern ambiguity, when in many circumstances, the answer was obvious.

“They’re homes,” she said, her voice wavering. “Or were. It was a village.”

“Oh.”

“It looks like it was completely abandoned,” Palmon said. “There’s nothing here now but forest debris.”

“What happened to the Digimon who lived here?” Tentomon asked.

“That might be up to us to find out,” Koushiro said. “They either chose to leave or were forced out.”

Mimi stayed silent. She could picture rows of the little, cozy dens when the community thrived with baby Digimon hopping or waddling to and fro, their eyes bright and carefree, sunshine twinkling down between the trees as if it were true instead of the grim, lifeless reality before her. Her breath caught in her throat. This wasn’t the first time she’d witnessed such a scene, and she bit her lip to keep from losing all composure as memories of the Dark Masters’ destruction washed over her. Back then, she only accepted the harm in fighting, the loss and grief that followed, but she wasn’t a child anymore, no longer saw the world in black and white. Her blood boiled. She understood as an adult. They fought to protect the Digital World, to maintain its harmony, and although she preferred peace to fists, she would do what was needed to reverse the atrocities inflicted. She would fight to rebuild. No one else would suffer. Not if she could stop it.

Her eyes glistened and Mimi willed the tears to stay, but two trickled down each side cheek, down to her chin. She wiped one away, its saltiness burning the scrapes on her wrist, but before she reached for the second, Koushiro whisked the drop away with his thumb. She flushed, embarrassed at being caught, but he didn’t say anything, not a rousing speech like Taichi would have done or strings of comforting words like she would expect from Sora; instead, he rested his hand in the middle of her back. It wasn’t a grand gesture, but it was enough, a warming support that kept her from shriveling like a raisin. 

He didn’t press her to move forward either, and although Mimi recognized the silliness in needing a few moments to collect herself, she was thankful for his patience and presence. That was always the hardest part of leaving Tokyo. At first, everything was the same and she jumped back in to her other life with little interruption. Then, the rift, as if she’d been sliced right down her center, but it healed after a few days, scabbed over with preoccupied ideas on how to further her career. But the fracture grew with each trip, pulling apart, and none of the usual New York charm could help her sew herself back together. It never took her long to settle back into the rhythmic cycle of seeing Koushiro every day, depending on him to be there, and when he wasn’t, there was nothing to fill the void.  
No. She couldn’t do this. Not right now. She could dwell on their relationship complications later.

Mimi rolled her shoulders, brushing his hand away, but she refused to look at him, afraid the tears wouldn’t stop after two. Koushiro wasn’t oblivious to her emotion but she prayed he wouldn’t think too much about it, but he took a step closer to her, and his face was mere inches away from hers as he reached towards her hair.

“You have a twig tangled in your braid,” he said.

Something between a giggle and hiccup escaped her lips, and she leaned forward so their noses touched. The effect was instantaneous. Koushiro blushed wildly, a fiery shade that rivaled her ‘Big Apple Red’ OPI nail polish, and Mimi rejoiced in her tiny victory over him.

A quiet shuffling brought them back to their senses, and they both tensed. The sound had echoed from every direction, and their heads spun this way and that, watching, searching, waiting. Their partners sprang into action, Palmon next to Koushiro with her vines bared like snakes and Tentomon covering Mimi, electricity cackling between his antennae. She glanced behind her, beyond where the insect Digimon hovered, as the trail wound back down, but saw nothing other than an opaque, evening mist as it melted into the gloom of the wood. The foursome stood still for several minutes, preparing for the attack that never materialized, and they didn’t hear any other noise, although Mimi was certain that the pounding in her chest was loud enough to rattle the hillside.

“Maybe a pinecone fell?” she whispered.

“Pinecones don’t trot through the woods,” Koushiro breathed back. Mimi was about to stick her tongue out at him, but he turned to Palmon, asking, “What did you feel on the ground?”

“It was quick,” she answered. “If not for the rustle, I wouldn’t have given it a second thought, but something bounded across the forest floor in three gentle steps before disappearing, probably latching on to the trees to keep hidden.”

Mimi peered up towards the spider web of branches and limbs that seemed to extend as far as she could see, wondering what other secrets they were hiding in their intricate net. More puzzle pieces, but no clear picture of what they needed to put together. A foreboding chill pricked at the back of her neck, reminding her that nightfall was close at hand and producing new fears for her imagination, which didn’t need any help to run away with fanciful ideas, and she tugged on Koushiro’s sleeve.

“We should keep going.”

He nodded, but said to each Digimon, “Keep your guard up.”

Twilight lingered in the forest, a gradual transition, marked by dimmed sunshine and muted colors. Although they heard nothing else to frighten them, shadows danced along the trees, gnarly, black claws created by branches wavering in the wind, and Mimi regretted ever feeling safe in their presence, as benign as they seemed at the time. The dark deepened on the ground, and her eyes struggled to adjust to the blue-grey aura that basked the understory in a murky afterglow, but as they climbed, remnants of stronger daylight promised to hold on for them.

After another half mile, their path widened and the trail became rocky, with rocks protruding like a staircase for them to step up. Palmon exclaimed that there was a break in the trees not much further ahead, and Mimi, with a rejuvenated and desperate spirit, clutched Koushiro’s hand and sprinted. He yelped at having his arm yanked but hung on. She didn’t care. She had to get out. No way was she about to be trapped in there after the sun eventually sank below the horizon. She craved openness, to embrace the sky and catch the last bit of light on her skin. 

The clearing was broad and flat, mostly made of large sheets of stone with pockets of earth here and there, and it led to a steep cliff, facing westward, and the sun greeted them like a long-lost friend, still peeking out above the faraway hills in the distance. But Mimi forgot about the light, wouldn’t have noticed if the night ambushed them from behind. The humans and Digimon inched towards the edge, where a large, ornate structure that seemed to grow from the very cliff side, was situated at the head of another trail that precariously wove its way back down the other side. 

“What is it?” she asked.

“I don’t have the faintest clue,” Koushiro responded, “but I’ll bet it’s important.”

Whatever it was, was made from stone, like the precipice itself, but smooth like glass, except where chunks of rock were missing. It had a stained, weathered look, as if it had withered from a past grandeur, and had been carved with intricate, unfamiliar designs that wrapped around its side like hard ropes and came down in front, molding into a single step that led inside to a tablet. Koushiro rushed forward, but Mimi was rooted in place, enthralled by the top, where a gruesome deer skull had been chiseled. The antlers spanned the entire structure, ending in sharp points, and instead of ears, two more horns, like fangs, curved down around the skull. Black sockets where its eyes should have been stared at Mimi, probed her, and it reminded her too much of the monstrous pine trees from before for her to hold her gaze. Another chill danced through her body, and she hopped up the step to meet Koushiro and the Digimon.

As she grew closer, she hummed. Lines of Digicode sprawled across the surface. No wonder Koushiro had his nose pressed up against it and the flashlight on his phone shining on them so he could get the best look. He snapped several photos, ensuring that not a fragment was missed, and muttering incomprehensible babble about characters he recognized from other sources. In the truest Koushiro fashion that made Mimi shake her head with an amused smile, he sat down on a nearby boulder, his laptop hovering on his knees while his face was buried in his phone. She could go up in flames and disappear, and he probably wouldn’t flinch. Or would she die of old age before he finished? 

“Why don’t you two stand on either side of this…this thing, and I’ll take a picture,” Mimi said to Palmon and Tentomon.

She took several before declaring a clear winner as far as cuteness was concerned, and edited it with her favorite filters. Out of habit, she opened Facebook only to have error banners pop up on her phone. ‘No Mobile Data Available’ and ‘Not Connected to WiFi Network’ flashed, and Mimi pouted. Oh right. How boring. 

“Kou. Shi. Ro.” 

The mock irritation laced in the way she broke up his name forced him to peer up from his screens out of sheer curiosity. She waved her phone around like a maniac while she still had his somewhat undivided attention, and skipped towards him.

“Can you connect me to the Internet? This place should have universal WiFi or something by now, right?”

“That...that’s not how it works...at all,” Koushiro sighed. “Human technology has never mingled well with the Digital World’s. Our phones function as a high tech version of the Digivices because of a Bluetooth program I wrote to link the two, and that was hard enough. We can call and text the other Chosen, open gates, and track each other’s location, but opening browsers or apps are outside the realm of their capabilities while we’re here.”

“I can’t post this pic on Live?! What is this, 2005? You should definitely improve these or I’m changing to a PinaPhone.”

“You wouldn’t! I designed the Digi-phones by scratch specifically for each of us. Those other brands won’t operate at all in the Digital World, and honestly, the latest Pineapple version is a waste of money if you ask me, and -”

“Chill out, I’m kidding,” Mimi giggled. “Don’t get yourself all worked up. I love my phone.” 

After all, it had been her suggestion to include the personal touch to differentiate all 12 from each other. She turned hers over, running her thumb across the Crest of Sincerity imprinted on the case.  
“I’m working on a way to link them back to the human world,” he said. “It’s not going to be an overnight fix, but hopefully someday you’ll be able to check up on all your social media accounts regardless of which world you’re in. I’d hate for you to miss the latest Taylor Swift tweet.”

“You like her too! I’ve heard you humming along to ‘Mine.’ Even Taichi knows. Admit it, Koushiro, admit it!” 

He raised his eyebrows at her with a fascinated, but solemn chuckle that Mimi was quick to detect, despite him glancing away as soon as their stares met and fixating on his laptop while twisting his phone in his grip. It was long enough for her to decipher a trace of concern in his brooding eyes, like a thunderstorm brewing off-shore, and she shared a similar, cloudy worry that they hadn’t yet heard from Taichi and Ken. It was so like Koushiro not to voice his sentiments aloud, especially when they couldn’t be founded on facts, but she remained glued to him until he picked his head back up to look at her. Her stomach twisted. There was something more. 

“What’s wrong?” she asked.

“The map is failing to load too,” he admitted. “When I open the app, it doesn’t show them, or us, and our location hasn’t updated either.”

Mimi checked hers, and a green circle in the top left hand corner continuously cycled while the map was stuck on the place they first entered the Digital World. She tried to keep her mind from racing, but it was too easy to assume that their phones had been reduced to paperweights with a camera. Would they be able to open a gate back home? She had no desire to sleep on cold, dead leaves tonight, but that wasn’t as alarming as the other question that popped into her head. Would the Digimon be able to evolve during an attack? 

“We brought our Digivices, Mimi,” Koushiro said, pointing to it clipped to her bag strap. “I made sure all four of us did. Taichi grumbled about it before we left.”

“That’s right,” she laughed nervously. This place had her so on edge that she wasn’t thinking straight. “And your laptop?”

“The programs Gennai installed work fine, which will allow me to begin deciphering this Digicode. That doesn’t help us with our communication problems, but it’s something. Here, take this.” He rummaged through his laptop bag and tossed her a device that looked like a cigarette lighter. “It’s a prototype portable charger. It works, just a little clunky. We should make sure our phones are at full battery in case the signal returns. Until then, I think it’s best for us to stay here. The clearing is safer than the woods. Nothing will be able to sneak up us on. We have full advantage of the cliff and our terrain.”

Mimi swallowed thickly but nodded, clutching the charger against her chest. She plugged it into her phone’s port, and dropped them both into her bag’s front pocket. She set down the last water bottle and a chocolate covered granola bar that she had been saving in case things took a turn for the worst (which they had, in her opinion) next to his feet and left him to his puzzle-solving, doubting if he noticed. Well. She twirled in a circle, wondering how to be useful, and her eyes fell upon the mysterious structure. Her lips pursed together. Although the entryway wasn’t large, it was partially enclosed, and if all four of them squeezed in against the tablet, it would provide decent protection.

The sun had almost completely dipped below the horizon. She clapped her hands together, and set to work before they lost the light. Palmon and Tentomon were more than happy to help her collect fallen pine tree branches and place rocks around the opening, much like the desolate shelters they passed in the forest. Mimi did her best to arrange the softer needles on the ground to provide a little cushion. Every now and again, her arms rubbed up against the bark or stone and stung from where she’d been scraped by thorn bushes. 

She rolled up her sleeves and grimaced at the long, pink marks. They weren’t deep, but she didn’t want to irritate them further, so she grabbed an antibiotic ointment and a handful of bandages, thanking Jou with all her heart for teaching everyone basic first aid and insisting they never travel to the Digital World without a kit. She tried to contort her body in all sorts of unnatural positions to cover the few on her back, but it wasn’t until Palmon came over to help her that every cut was attended to.

“Oh, temple?” they heard Koushiro exclaim. “No, wait that’s not right. Not temple, not alter…”

“Will you bring these over to him, and on your way back, pull down a couple more branches for me?” Mimi asked her partner.

“With the fluffy needles?” 

“You got it! And Palmon,” she called as her partner hurried away. “Force him to put the bandages on. Digicode can wait. Do it for him if you have to.” 

Mimi and Tentomon grabbed piles of leaves and shoved them into the very back of the entryway. It wasn’t going to be a memory foam mattress with knitted blankets, but it would do. They shuffled out to admire their handiwork, and the final, golden sunbeam glossed over the cliff side. As Mimi followed its path on the ground, running towards her, towards the edge, she trembled.

It reflected off the back of the structure, a point they couldn’t see, but it shined through the stone, illuminating the deer skull hieroglyph in a sinister, crimson glow, and it pulsed, a thump-thump of a heartbeat that coincided with her own, leaping into her throat and threatening to suffocate her. Tentomon was yelling at her to move, but despite the constant quiver vibrating throughout her body, terror paralyzed her in place. The beam filtered down to the Digicode, which now resembled blood seeping out of cruel slashes, and through them, tendrils of light fell back onto her chest and shoulders. Red. Angry. Searing. Her nerves wailed, sizzling under their bitter blaze as they coiled around her. She raked her nails across her scalp, tugging at her hair with every ounce of strength she had left; and choked out harrowing sobs, feeling herself being wrenched back towards the tablet as she lost control of her limbs. She couldn’t resist, couldn’t break its hold of her. It wanted her. She was powerless to resist. A familiar someone called her name, no, multiple someone’s, until their voices faded into nothingness. 

Their voices were so far away.

She wished they were closer.

Help me. Please. Make it stop. It hurts. It hurts.

Dying would be better than this, better than being devoured by flames lapping all around her. Her shoulder collided with the tablet, a fragment of Digicode branding into her skin.

She opened her lips into a hysteric scream that ached her lungs, but never heard it escape. Everything was red, soldering into her widened eyes until she saw nothing else.

A lump collided into her shoulder and she fell through the ground, falling, falling. The end never came, only a continuous cycle of breaking into a million pieces and plunging into an eternal abyss. Harder she shattered. Deeper she sank. Finally the pain was too much for her mind to bear, and instead of red, she was consumed by darkness.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Jumping to Koushiro's POV for a bit! And finding out what Taichi and Ken have been up to.
> 
> I don't own Digimon or any of its characters.

Good puzzles forced one to think differently, to approach the problem from uncomfortable angles in order to determine a solution. The scrawl of Digicode fell into this category, challenging enough to test Koushiro’s ability, but not to the point where he was concerned about solving it. With time, and they had ample amounts of that, he was certain he could crack the code despite how clunky Gennai’s program was to run on his laptop. He needed to cross-reference fragments with other documents that Gennai and Centarumon had discovered and translated, then make astronomical inferences where gaps remained; and because his phone wasn’t working, he couldn’t upload the photos to the server and actually use the program to detect similarities between texts. Instead, he zoomed in on a character with his phone, memorized it, and raked through the other sources on his laptop in hopes of finding a match. 

It was tedious and intricate, and Koushiro enjoyed every minute. For one, he excelled in deciphering riddles, and equally important was the fact that it prevented his mind from wandering. The guilt for pushing Taichi and Ken out of his thoughts lasted no more than a brief pang in his chest. What more could he do for them? They were all exhausted from walking for hours, and embarking on a wild goose chase in an unfamiliar territory during the night without communication was a disaster in the making. No, he was better suited here, perched on an uncomfortable boulder, one minute with his phone centimeters from his eyes, and squinting at his laptop the next. It was all he knew to do.

That was how Koushiro functioned. Work became a means to forget about the things he didn’t want to remember, and most of the time, he wanted to forget. 

He glanced down towards the water bottle and granola bar at his feet and suppressed a soft smile. But not always. 

He translated several key word meanings with relative ease, but the tricky part would be in stringing them together to form a cognitive thought. It didn’t help that the markings on the tablet were old and weathered, and Digicode in general often resembled a child’s garbled handwriting. Something about a guardian or protector or preserver popped up in a few places, as well as words pertaining to the forest and trees, which made sense. He also deciphered East and West as locations, but to what, he hadn’t determined yet. 

Wait.

Koushiro looked up and watched Mimi, Palmon, and Tentomon race each other with their hands full of leaves, most of which caught the wind, towards the stone structure, their shadows elongated on the ground from the sun’s remaining beams.

The text was referring to itself, perched on the cliff towards the sunset. Towards the West. He scanned his phone for the character that would most likely lead him in the right direction, the active noun, but Digicode didn’t follow any basic language rules (because why would it?), so he tried two and translated desolation and darkness, which were not only incorrect, but uncomforting. The third, ‘altar’ was more promising, but not a complete comparison because the code for altar was missing a distinct squiggle, so he analyzed a different source.

“Oh, temple?” he cried. “No, wait that’s not right. Not temple, not altar…” 

Think, Koushiro, think.

“Shrine!”

A shrine built for the guardian, situated in the western part of the forest. It was a guess, but an educated one, and until he could communicate with Gennai, he would have to make do. He arranged the known words to the best of his ability in a separate document, drawing lines between them with his mouse pad, but there was too much missing for him to piece anything further together. Onto the next fragment.

Palmon popped up between his legs, blocking his screen with a triumphant grin.

“I brought you ointment and bandages to clean up any scratches from earlier,” she said. 

“They’re not bad. I’ll do it later.” 

“Now. Mimi said to use force if it comes to that.” Her eyes narrowed in spirited competition. “Is it going to come to that?”

He lifted his laptop and swung his right leg around her, but Palmon, much like her human partner to his bemusement, didn’t back down. She laced her vines around the screen, and pulled him back in front of her. 

“This is important,” he said, refusing to give the Digimon an ounce of satisfaction. 

“So is this,” she countered and rattled the bandages in his face. “Your shoulder was bleeding, dummy.”

“Huh?” He looked over, and sure enough, a cut on the back of his arm had stained his t-shirt. “Well, it doesn’t hurt.” 

“I’ll do it for you. That way you won’t have to stop working and Mimi won’t have to come over here herself.” 

“Is that what you meant by force?” he laughed. “Calling Mimi?”

“I will,” she threatened, turning away, but Koushiro put his hand over her mouth.

“No, no, your terms are fair.” 

“I thought so.”

Koushiro settled onto the ground and leaned against the boulder so Palmon wouldn’t have to reach up, continuing where he left off in the translation, but his focus drifted, and more than once, he peeked up to watch Mimi and Tentomon fluff pine needles as if they were staying in a five star hotel. It didn’t help that Palmon sung the chorus of ‘Love Story’ under her breath while she patched his arms, over and over like a broken record, and before long, he was tapping his foot and humming with her. It was almost normal, and for a moment, Koushiro forgot he wasn’t at home, listening to Mimi and her partner belt show tunes at the top of their lungs as she stirred a homemade dinner on the stovetop that she used more than him. 

In moments like those, he couldn’t help but stare at her, wondering if he would ever be able to piece her together. She was so unlike him in every possible way, his polar opposite, and he couldn’t resist the magnetic pull he felt towards her whenever she drew near, the desire to want to know her better than she knew herself. But that was the thing about Mimi. She was like water, always in movement, forever dynamic, with the possibility of slipping through his fingers.

The best puzzles were so multi-faceted as to lack any concrete answer, eternal enigmas that existed outside his understanding, and Mimi was his favorite of all. He doubted whether a lifetime would be long enough to solve her mysteries, but Koushiro wouldn’t mind spending the rest of his years trying.

There were some memories too engraved in his mind for him to erase, no matter how many hours of work he piled on. He could have lived in the moment forever, like going to sleep and emerging into a familiar dream. 

Koushiro was no stranger to the importance of a moment. How it shaped and defined a person, stopped the very Earth. It was a single moment that left him without any other knowledge of his birth parents besides what his mother and father told him in stories. It was why an omnipotent being in the Digital World chose him after he sauntered out to the balcony in Hikarigaoka. It was how they, time after time after time, saved this world from destruction. They lost friends in mere seconds. They gained strength as a team in even less. 

It took one moment in the back of a fancy government vehicle for Koushiro to pay attention to Mimi. He had yet to stop. It was another, after she moved to New York for the second time, when he realized he was hopelessly in love with her. That hadn’t ended either, despite the back and forth, the early morning and late night phone calls, the lonely sighs, and agitated hours at work. 

He wasn’t stupid. Koushiro assessed all the details, calculated time and distance and tried to quantify the strength of love. The odds were not favorable, not when they each lived separate lives for 50 (49 if he was lucky) weeks in the year. But she was Mimi, so he, in a clear breach with what he believed in, discarded logic and gambled everything. Because moments with her were worth everything.

Moment after moment after moment. 

The world ceased to exist the moment Tentomon yelled frantically.

Koushiro’s head snapped up, his breath catching in his throat, and Palmon dropped the remaining bandages in her hands with a whimper. The shrine burned a sickly red, and despite the myriad of questions ricocheting in his head, one after another, demanding to be processed and answered, he latched onto a single thought.

Mimi.

He shoved his laptop off, not caring where it ended up, and stuffed his phone into his pocket. Palmon wrapped her vines around his neck, and he sprinted. The distance wasn’t far, but Koushiro never ran and his breath came out in pathetic wheezes. Tentomon was begging Mimi to move, but she had gone catatonic, eyes glazed over upon the deer skull rendition at the top of the shrine. Koushiro hadn’t noticed it before, too intent on the Digicode. He didn’t like the way it looked back at them.

“Mimi?” he asked, grabbing her wrist. 

Her skin was brittle to the touch, and she didn’t acknowledge his presence. He tried again, pulling on her hand, but she wouldn’t budge, just continued to stare.

“Tentomon!” Koushiro called. “Digivolve!”

Before his partner had the chance, crimson beams fell upon Mimi, engulfing her and Tentomon in a faint glow that pulsed as if it were alive, and she howled in pain as each one slowly snaked itself around her as he recoiled back. Palmon flung her vines wildly at her partner, but when they made contact, she screeched, a sharp sizzling penetrating the air. Koushiro should have put two-and-two together, but he couldn’t think about anything at all, anything beyond Mimi’s cries, the sound reverberating in his ears like being trapped inside of a recurring nightmare. She gripped and yanked her hair until her knuckles turned white, wide, frightened eyes scanning in every direction for something. 

He wondered if it was for him, and whispered, “Can you fight it?” Then, in a louder voice, “Mimi, Mimi! You have to fight!”

He reached for her arm, desperate to pull her out of the hell surrounding her, but it repelled him with a burning shock. He flung his hand back, but not before several angry blisters bubbled across his palm, the nauseating smell of burning flesh stinging his nostrils. His burning flesh. Only sheer panic and horror kept him from feeling a sliver of pain.

He couldn’t tear his eyes away from the orb as it slowly began to move of its own accord. Mimi had gone limp, but her body moved forward.

“Koushiro, what’s happening?” Tentomon cried. “I…I don’t have the strength to Digivolve.”

He didn’t know what to do.

“It’s pulling them back inside,” Palmon whispered, holding her hands gingerly. “What do we do? How do we save them?” 

He didn’t have an answer. 

He couldn’t do anything useful.

All he could do was continue to yell her name. Palmon and Tentomon joined, but their voices were drowned out by her wails, each one louder than the last and penetrating through Koushiro’s heart like Togemon’s needle attack. 

“Help me. Please. Make it stop. It hurts.  _ It hurts _ .” 

The last part was wrought with anger and agony, and he bit his lip to hold back tears because he had no idea what was happening. He always had some inkling of how to proceed, how to adapt to the situation, how to formulate a plan of action, but as he glanced up towards the shrine and back to Mimi, his brain came up short. He screwed his eyes shut to think, but wrenched them open immediately, panic swelling in his chest like an overinflated balloon. He didn’t know. Didn’t know. Didn’t know. 

Her body flailed against the tablet, and the primal scream that echoed from her lips made Koushiro’s blood run cold. Palmon wept beside him, begging to help and he had to hold her back from leaping into the fray. 

“You can’t! You can’t, you can’t, you can’t.” He seemed to be repeating the words to himself. 

The shrine throbbed red, and as the sun finally sank below the horizon, it turned black. He felt a faint vibration against his leg, but that was insignificant now. Mimi wouldn’t stop screaming. He couldn’t see them, the shrine was completely saturated with a thick, impenetrable black aura. Palmon struggled against his hold, her tears running down to his hands. He left one stung, but that didn’t matter either. 

“Tentomon…” 

“Don’t worry, Koushiro,” his partner said feebly. “I’ll protect her, I promise.” 

The balloon billowed further. 

A final beat drummed, and they vanished. 

How long had it taken? An eternity? No. Seconds. Less than a minute had passed since he heard Tentomon calling for help. As quickly as his world shattered, in a moment, the Digital World settled into a typical evening, basking in a growing, tranquil darkness. It was as if nothing had happened. The shrine was still as stone, empty and hovering like an unwelcome shadow, but all traces of crimson had been wiped away. 

So many questions he couldn’t begin to solve. Too many. Contrasted with the single thought that echoed in his ears: Your fault. Your fault. Your fault.

He was drowning.

Koushiro’s brain shifted to autopilot.

The balloon blew. He was frozen, unable to focus on anything other than images flashing before his eyes, seared into his head, and no matter how hard he squeezed his eyes closed, they continued to play. He willed his pulse to slow down, but it raced on, and with every irregular breath, a sharp pang stung his lungs. His legs gave out from underneath him and he collapsed onto his knees, choking out horribly ugly sobs and holding his shoulders in a pathetic attempt to control the shaking. The frenzy of emotions that he was usually so skillful at concealing, spilled all around him, but he had to let them out or else he’d never pluck the courage to keep going.

“Koushiro?” Palmon whispered, holding onto his leg. “Koushiro? Not you too. You’re not going to disappear too?” 

Of that, he was sorrowfully certain. He recognized enough symptoms to diagnose himself.

“No…I think…panic attack.”

Palmon wrapped her vines around his middle and squeezed, despite the obvious pain that doing so would cause. The ends were shriveled and crisped, but she didn’t let go until his breath was under control and his limbs slackened from the built up tension. 

Twenty-six minutes. He had timed it. His head was numb but beginning to work again, although slowly, but it was imperative that he focus. He and Mimi were vulnerable without their own partners; there was only so much a rookie Digimon could do without Digivolving.

His left hand prickled with heat. He and Palmon both needed ointment and bandages. Those were still by his laptop, but their other supplies had gone wherever Mimi and Tentomon went. That was good, in a sense. It meant she had her bag, most of the medical equipment, an empty water bottle, maybe a handful of almonds, her phone…

His phone! He pulled it out and frowned at the unread messages. Why had service returned? Was it connected to the shrine? His questions, though nagging, were too much for his diminished mental capabilities, and he opened his chat and focused on the several from Taichi first.

_ I’m bored. Didn’t Gennai say there was something wrong here? All Ken and I have found are trees. What about you? _

_ Are you ignoring me because Mimi is here? I’m way more interesting. _

_ Koushirooooooooooooooooo.  _

_ Nvm, definitely something in here. Following us. I’ll keep you posted. If you’re even getting these. Ken discovered that the maps aren’t working. Pretty sure our phones have shit the bed, but I know you’re already aware of this. _

_ We have no idea which direction we’re going. North at first, but since then we’ve taken a few trails that seem to be winding east. The thing is still creeping behind us a ways, but never too far. Unless we’re going crazy. Agumon and Wormmon are aware of it too though. Not sure if that’s comforting or not. We’re all on edge. _

_ Greymon and Stingmon are battling the thing. Digimon, I guess. Maybe? Idk. It’s not right. It’s shadowy. Our attacks aren’t landing. Seems to go right through it. But it can hit us. Sending a few pictures that I took against my better judgement. You can yell at me later. They’re blurry as hell but you might be able to do something with them. If they actually go through. You were right about bringing our Digivices. Sorry. _

_ The shadow Digimon/not Digimon disintegrated into the night. The fuck? We’re fine. Agumon and Wormmon are eating. _

_ Hey! I just got a text from you. I’m assuming you didn’t get any of my previous messages until just now? You okay? Any idea what the actual fuck is going on? _

_ Answer me, you moron, I have to make sure you’re alive and Ken says not to call because if you haven’t turned your ringtone off, it could give away your position if you’re hiding.  _

Koushiro knew it had been wise to pair Ken with Taichi. He almost smiled.

“Taichi,” he mumbled. Palmon stirred next to him. “It’s Taichi. We have service again.”

The pain in his hand was becoming unbearable, so he lifted Palmon up and sauntered back over to the boulder, desiring to escape the shrine’s silent malignity. He bandaged her hands and his left one to the best of his limited ability. Mimi would have done better. He shivered, forgetting about Taichi entirely because he could wait another minute before receiving a response. Instead, he grabbed the granola bar and split it between Palmon and himself, despite wishing she hadn't left it behind. Left him behind. It was difficult to chew. He pulled up his conversation with Mimi. His breath caught in his throat again, the world spinning slightly, but he steadied himself. The last thing they had talked about was the reasonableness of purchasing silk bed sheets. She was all for them. He had several arguments against them. It had been yesterday afternoon, but that felt like an eternity ago. There were a million things he could ask her. Where was she? Was she okay? Was Tentomon with her? Would she stay in Tokyo forever because he couldn’t stand when she was gone and now he didn’t know whether she was lost forever?

_ Let me know you’re both safe. _

He opened the map application, using his fingers to swipe around. Some miles to the east were Taichi’s and Ken’s signals. (The former would be pleased in his directional skills. Koushiro fondly recalled a time when he couldn’t render a map to save his life.) He wasn’t surprised that Mimi’s didn’t show up, but couldn’t help but hope. 

Koushiro switched back to his chat with Taichi. All his messages were marked with a 6:04pm timestamp, indicating the exact time service returned, except for the final two, 6:07pm and 6:10pm respectively. He wrote out a long text, relaying their current situation, every last detail, from the glitch to his theory about the virus, from stumbling across a deserted and broken down village to the shrine, and asking what time his original text went through. He preferred to be thorough in drawing hypotheses. It took him a frustratingly long time to type with only his right hand. He then scanned Gennai’s message, which seemed to confirm his suspicions about a rogue Digidestined in a roundabout way without giving any direct answer. All in all, it was very Gennai-like. He sent a follow-up text, copying the last one, but attaching the photos he had taken of the shrine tablet.

Taichi was quick in responding, and Koushiro felt his own courage flare up at his friend’s assurance. He always knew the right things to say, how to lift everyone’s spirits. It made him believe.

_ Got your first message at 6:04. Is that important? Probably or you wouldn’t have asked. Listen, stay where you are. We’re going to find you. Ken’s pulling up your location rn, and Wormmon is more than capable of Digivolving and flying us. Then we’ll formulate a strategy based on all the facts. Gennai should be able to help with the Digicode, and I’ve asked him about the shadow Digimon. Hikari and Yamato were already on standby, I know the others will jump in if it comes to that. We won’t give up, and we’re not going back without Mimi. I promise. The Digital World can wait. And don’t you dare blame yourself. _

That reminded him that he hadn’t analyzed Taichi’s photos.

The goggle-head was right about two things: they were fuzzy and unfocused to the point where Hikari would have been ashamed to be related to him, and he certainly lacked any judgement whatsoever since it appeared that he had climbed halfway up a tree to take them. 

Koushiro squinted and gasped. 

“What, what?” Palmon asked, jostled from sleep.

He zoomed in on the second picture, which was a tad bit clearer, despite the thumb mark on the bottom left hand corner. The shadow was mostly shapeless, but at the top of what he assumed to be its head, there was a rack of black antlers.

***

She was engulfed in flames, burning from the inside out, suspended in fluffy clouds of fiery steam. Perhaps she was falling into the pits of hell. Perhaps it was eternal.

But someone called her name, timid and afraid, tapping her like she was made of glass. The visions faded, and Mimi realized she had been dreaming. She was slow in prying open her leaden eyelids, waiting for the scorching anguish to overwhelm her again. Sleeping or not, she knew it would return.

Only it didn’t.

“Mimi?” Tentomon’s voice pushed her to wake completely.

She wiggled her fingers and flexed her feet. Moving was strange but not unpleasant. A dull ache murmured in every limb, but it wasn’t searing. Not like before. In fact, she was cold. Had it all been a dream?

She rolled herself into a seated position. No, some parts were real. She didn’t recognize where she was, but she couldn’t shake a familiarity with the area. The sky was a hazy, twilight grey that melted down into the trees surrounding her. There were more than she could count, black, with branches that thrust upwards like pitchforks. No trail was in sight, they seemed to have landed in the depths of the forest. A soft sheet of snow enveloped the ground, twinkling icily, and she ran her fingers through the faint, delicate flakes, so unlike the nor’eastern storms that pummeled New York City and left feet of thick, wet snow in Central Park to shape into snowmen. She wanted to do that with Koushiro next winter. Maybe ambush him with snowballs. If he’d visit. She hoped he would and wasn’t above dragging him by the ear.

“Are you hurt?” Tentomon asked.

“I don’t think so?”

“Do you remember what happened?”

“A little.”

“That structure swallowed us, well, you. It came after you. I was just baggage.”

“It came to life, I think. I heard a heartbeat.”

Her voice cracked, and her throat dry and sleepy like the rest of her body. She vaguely remembered why, trembling as memories flitted in and out of her head like fireflies. Red and blood and screaming and misery. It was an uncanny feeling, having her mind recall excruciating terrors that threatened to eat her alive, that must have happened, without any real consequences. Physically, it had been torture, and she rubbed her chest and shoulders, where she had been impaled, but her skin was smooth, unblemished. Phantom twinges coursed through her sternum, her back. So, so real. The torture was reserved to her thoughts.

“I should be battered and bruised,” she added. “I saw things. Felt things. I thought I was dying. It was so real to me. I can taste the agony on the tip of my tongue, but it’s like the pain has been clouded.” 

She paused. That was enough detail. “Are we alone?”

“Yes. I made sure not to wander too far away from you in case you stirred, but I did a quick perimeter sweep. Up this hill, I found a trickling stream and filled your bottle. However, I don’t believe Koushiro and Palmon came along on this trip.”

Mimi exhaled a melancholic giggle. Tentomon hopped beside her and rested his claw on her hand. A line of dirt caked one side of his face, so she wiped it off with her thumb.

“I’m sorry we’ve been separated,” she whispered, hot tears welling in her eyes. “I know I’m not Koushiro.”

“Don’t cry, Mimi. I’m here. I’m not going anywhere.” 

She sniffed. “I’m glad you’re with me.”

Her phone dinged, and they both jumped at the noise cutting through the still air. She recovered first, wiping her cheeks and tearing through her bag, only slightly guilty that she never turned her phone to vibrate. Koushiro had only reminded her four times, but it was the most welcome sound in the world. Six small words brought a genuine smile to her face.

“It’s Koushiro,” she said. “Our phones are working again! I have to call – ”

A deep-throated bleating in the distance, oscillating through the trees, stopped her. It could be nothing. Or something. Probably the latter. It wasn’t her day. She pressed her finger to her lips, and Tentomon nodded. They crawled to a nearby hollowed out tree trunk, Mimi shimmying on her belly to fit inside after the Digimon. She silenced her phone and typed out a response, erasing long sections, rewriting them, and adding adequate punctuation before she was satisfied.

_ We’re both okay. I’m not sure how. I was watching the sunset and then there was so much red. Tentomon says the structure took us, but I don’t know how we got here, or where here is, but there are a lot of trees. Maybe in a forest somewhere. Don’t call! We heard something and are hiding. Don’t worry, it was far off. Are you and Palmon okay???? What about Taichi and Ken??? _

She passed the water bottle to Tentomon after chugging half of it and relishing the coolness that calmed her throat. She absent-mindedly touched her phone so the screen didn’t dim. Minutes passed. At least it felt like minutes. Mimi tended to be impatient. When the chat icon finally lit up with a notification, she tapped it and devoured the message.

_ I don’t know what happened either. But I’ll find out. Everyone is fine. Palmon and I are a little banged up, but nothing we can’t handle. Taichi and Ken are on their way to us, and I’m waiting to hear back from Gennai about the Digicode text. We believe it’s connected to wherever the shrine sent you. We’ll find you. Are you certain that you’re still in the forest? The same forest? I couldn’t find your location. Stay safe. Don’t engage if you can help it. Your volume better be turned off. _

A second came through before she could begin to answer the first.

_ You’re right about the silk sheets. _

Mimi rolled her eyes but smiled affectionately at her phone. She had no doubt that she would eventually win that battle.

She was fast at texting, and already had a lengthy response when she changed her mind and deleted it. She had planned on telling him that it was different, that there was snow on the ground where she and Tentomon ended up. They hadn’t come across any signs of winter or frost before, but it was wrong. She recognized the atmosphere, the growing oppressive weight pressing down on her soul. It was the same. The same feeling as when they stumbled into the glitch. She wouldn’t mistake it.

She wanted to confirm her suspicion with the map, but as she honed in on her location, her brows furrowed and a hole opened in the pit of her stomach. Two signals blinked unapologetically at her. Koushiro needed to know.

_ My phone says we’re right next to each other. _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Someone give Koushiro and Mimi hugs.
> 
> We've had a few really nice scenes with Mimi and Tentomon so I wanted to give Koushiro and Palmon their due too. The Digimon comforting their partners' partners is so wholesome to write.


End file.
